Sweden bans Duel after a promised IP block was not in place

Sweden’s gambling regulator has banned Immortal Snail LLC, the company behind the crypto casino Duel, from offering gambling in Sweden without a Swedish licence. The prohibition in case 26Si2185 is dated 28 October 2026 and took effect immediately.

Spelinspektionen opened the case because it suspected that duel.com was directing gambling at Sweden. The decision is not a finding that the company ignored an order it had already been served. The missed IP block is one of the facts the regulator used to decide that the site was still aimed at Sweden.

Why the regulator treated Duel as aimed at Sweden

The authority made a covert test purchase on the site and did not complete it. The inspection found Swedish as a language when payment methods were chosen, Swedish kronor as a selectable payment currency, and marketing through Swedish-language websites aimed at Swedish consumers. It also found nothing showing that Swedish consumers were blocked from registering and opening an account.

Under the Gambling Act, online gambling that is not directed at Sweden falls outside the Swedish licensing requirement. Whether a site is aimed at Sweden is judged from the circumstances as a whole. The decision notes that Swedish text, and deposits or winnings in Swedish currency, are relevant indicators.

The decision identifies Immortal Snail LLC as a Nevis company, registration number L22982, at Arthur Evelyn Building, Suite 5, Main Street, Charlestown. It records that duel.com said the company held Anjouan licence ALSI-202411026-FI1. That offshore claim is not treated as permission to target Sweden.

The company said Sweden would be blocked

Immortal Snail told the regulator that Swedish is an international language and that it would not stop offering Swedish on the site. It said Sweden should be blocked by IP address, and that it could not control whether payments were made in kronor.

On 28 October Spelinspektionen checked the site again. The promised IP block against Sweden had not been implemented. Swedish and SEK were still present when the site was opened from a Swedish IP address, and the regulator said Swedish-language marketing was continuing.

On that combined assessment, the authority found that Immortal Snail was offering gambling directed at Sweden and had no Swedish licence. Unit head Robert Larsson took the decision, after a presentation by investigator Nikolas Tsoros. The decision says it should apply immediately because of consumer protection, and it includes instructions for an appeal. It does not impose a separate fine.

What Swedish players should take from the order

A foreign licence number on the site is not a Swedish licence. Spelinspektionen says players at operators without a Swedish licence have weaker protection: contract terms and marketing are not under the same Swedish rules, help from Swedish authorities can be hard to get if a withdrawal goes wrong, and winnings can be taxable in Sweden. Licensed operators must offer Spelpaus self-exclusion. Operators without a Swedish licence do not have to. Playing at an unlicensed site is not itself a criminal offence for the player, but the player is outside those protections.

Duel has a separate record of provocative promotion. In September the Jewish Telegraphic Agency reported Nazi imagery and racist and antisemitic language in Duel-linked gambling streams and at a combat-sports event the company promoted in Orlando. Those reports are not the legal basis of the Swedish ban. The ban rests on unlicensed gambling directed at Sweden.